


All the Way Down

by thalassashells



Category: Dark Souls (Video Games)
Genre: F/F, so like typical blighttown fare, weird depictions of grime and stuff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-10-06
Updated: 2017-01-22
Packaged: 2018-08-19 20:16:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8223515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thalassashells/pseuds/thalassashells
Summary: The rogue witch Beatrice is on a journey, and Quelana of Izalith can barely imagine why. (i started something about beatrice's story in whatever timeline she's living and idk what im doing with it, also i ship the cool witches, anyway,)





	1. Meetings

Blighttown is hardly a land with distinction between night and day. It is constantly plunged in a deep, corrosive sort of darkness, reflected in the soil itself and the creatures who have adapted to it's toxicity. It is the kind of dark you only see after staring at the light too long and then having it go out, abruptly, violently, the flickering torches on the walls no different from colors dancing in your eyes.

Yet Quelana of Izalith, like any living or unliving creature, craves her rest. Night comes when she wills it, walled into a small shack near the base of the archtree and wrapped in a dingy, coarse blanket (as if there was any other kind), a small flame burning to keep cragspiders and mosquitos from her nest.

And so, the last thing she expects is to hear the harsh breathing of another human, and a frankly obnoxious knock on her door.

She readies her flame, though she doubts both the sanity and the ability of anyone willing to seek shelter in Blighttown, and opens the door to find-

A young woman, soaked head to toe in grime, clutching a catalyst that looked more like a tree branch in one hand and a large pointed hat in the other, nearly doubled over with a face as sickly pale as one cursed.

"Please," she wheezes, hoarse, covering her mouth with one hand, "moss, I beg-" she breaks into coughs.

Quelana sighs, and ushers her inside.   
\--  
She managed to stumble inside, take some of the moss Quelana rummaged for and promptly throw it up again, take a second dose, and fall right asleep on the shack floor.

Little was said--or had to be said, to Quelana's relief--before she dozed off, but the girl had managed to introduce herself as "Beatrice". It was plain to see that she was a witch, from her traditional attire to her strange catalyst that radiated with old, old magic.

Her hair is light brown and cropped short, framing her round cheeks and nose and dark brown eyes. Quite pretty, and quite foolish, as it is all marred with mud and grime, blood and viscera so odd in color it could only belong to the residents of this awful swamp.

Quelana knew not what to do but watch her rest, occasionally rest a hand on her forehead to see if her fever was reducing, though she pondered if the fire running in her veins made it hard to tell... Sitting and watching was going to kill her. She takes a rag and begins to wipe down the woman's face, gently as she can, just to keep anything from setting in wounds--

And she wakes up. 

"Such good bedside manner," Beatrice says, her voice hoarse and weak. She smiles, eyes half lidded and staring directly into Quelana's, who is still hovering mere inches from her face as she tries to clean a cut.

Quelana thinks nothing of it. "Thank you," she says, unperturbed but not unkind, "I am just trying to prevent further infection."

Silence settles over the room and Beatrice allows her to continue her work, trying not to squirm too much at the sting of grime being cleaned from cuts and gashes. She can feel Beatrice itching to squirm, to move, like any fool on a mission who cares little about death. Eventually, she deems her acceptable, and balls up the now dirtied rag and pulls away.

"I should be thanking you." Beatrice tries again, "I am sorry if I've intruded, but I will soon be on my-"

"I hardly own this accursed place," Quelana chuckles, "But I do often find myself the only resident. But let us not dance around the question: you are no pyromancer. What is it you seek?"

Beatrice's eyes light up, as if she's been waiting a lifetime for someone to ask, and she blurts out: "The Four Kings of the Abyss."

Quelena goes quiet, and pulls her hood down as if to hear better, "Pardon? I was asking you seriously."

Beatrice pouts, as indignant as anyone with moss on her lip can look, "I am quite serious. I was only here in search of their trail."

"Then you have gone quite the wrong way." Quelana says. How mad was this girl? To cross the valley of drakes, or perhaps the depths of Undead Burg in search of kings long lost?

"...Have I?" Beatrice is quiet now, her bravado lost again. 

Quelana shakes her head, and makes way for the back of the little hut where what seems to be makeshift stove top lies, jars filled with herbs and preserved food that only someone with nothing else to eat would touch. This was going to be a long story, and she would not be without tea.

She sees Beatrice's head pop up in the corner of her eye as she wields a gentle flame to the stove top, the reaction she's seen many times of those unfamiliar with pyromancy.

 "You are of the Great Swamp?" Beatrice asks, attempting to stand and promptly stumbling back down to her pile of rags as she predictably overestimated her recovery.

"...In a sense." Quelana says, "But I will not be the first to answer questions. You are in my home, after all."

She pours a cup of hopelessly bitter tea for Beatrice and one for herself, and takes a seat on the floor with the lost witch.

"Now, start from the beginning."


	2. Upward

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> haha wow i guess i AM updating this!! not a whole lot happens in this chapter but im trying to get into the groove of a continuing story...hope its ok! thank u

  She’d recovered quickly from the poison, and spoke so fervently of her quest that Quelana hardly had time to get a word in edgewise. Beatrice wasted what Quelana swore must be all the breath in her lungs on near incoherent blathering about the origin of sorcery.

  She knows these things, she may have been young when Oolacile rose and fell, when Xanthous ruled where Carthus now stood, but she was there. Yet somehow hearing it from a fresh face, who had pieced together so much with so little, was new in and of itself. 

  (And perhaps, she admitted to herself, she had been too wrapped up in her mother’s kingdom to watch the rest of the world with much clarity.) 

   Beatrice may not have been a pyromancer, but something in her burned all the same. 

  “…I do believe that my family-- me, my little brother, my mother and father, and my grandmother that is-- are the only ones still using unrefined branches for their sorcery. Though we have not returned to Vinheim for some time. It is not as though it is an inherently more powerful method, I have found, but more  _ versatile _ \- “

  “Beatrice- “Quelana tries to interrupt.

  “The dullards don’t know what they’re missing, at least Catarina- “ 

  “ _ Beatrice.”  _

  She stops, flushing red. 

  Quelana nods, “I am quite satisfied with what you seek, but can you tell me why?”

  Silence falls over the room. Beatrice pretends to be focused on drinking her tea – it had gone cold while she spoke. Quelana’s life is different periods of silent waiting, and this was no different. Beatrice had a small leather sack with her that implied a planned journey, but it had barely enough supplies in it to last her a week, let alone a journey that could take years. One change of clothes, a water skin growing thin, a beautifully woven blanket that would not survive more than a couple of nights in the outside world.

  “…I don’t know. I just wanted to.” She finally says. 

  “Seems an unsubstantial reason to come so far from home.”  

  “At least I have left home! How long has it been since you left this hut?” Beatrice stares her down, brow furrowed. 

  “I don’t know.” Quelana admits.

  Beatrice huffs, “And why not?”

  Quelana casts her eyes downwards.

  “So, there we have it. Neither of us have our reasons.” Beatrice laughs. She reaches for her hat and pulls it snugly over her head. Quelana had to wonder if it was more of a burden than a help from how heavy it seemed to be, buckling under its own weight.  She continues to gather her things as though         Quelana had disappeared from the room. She rummages through the blanket to be sure she hadn’t dropped anything – she had, a small token barely the size of her palm—and double checks her bag. 

  Quelana can hardly remember the last time she had been on something that would constitute a quest. 

  “You will keep searching, then?” she asks.

  Beatrice nods, “Absolutely. I hope you’re not trying to stop me again.” Her voice is tinged with irritation, the kind of thorny tone someone learns to cultivate when they’ve lost one too many times. 

  “Hardly,” Quelana assures her, “I simply wish to go with you. You seem as though you could use the protection.”

  Beatrice lifts the brim of her heavy hat to look at Quelana again, and her smile burns.

\--

  And so, a witch who had seen centuries must follow a woman with hardly 30 summers under her belt out of her own home.

  What point had there been to leave? She would blame it on Undead when Beatrice asked again, or the legions of Hollows, or the remaining drakes. As if those things stood a chance against her.

  Her only true answer was cowardice. Comfort in her own personal limbo where the sun never rose or set. Perfect stillness. Perfect lack of painful progress.

  She scraped her knees climbing after her much nimbler companion, her bare feet becoming quickly riddled with splinters. Beatrice begins to insist that she hold Quelana’s hand about halfway up.

  “You need not treat me like a child.” Quelana snaps to extinguish the flame in her hand that she had just used to set a cragspider ablaze. 

  “What if one of us slips? Better safe than separated.” Beatrice tries, extending her hand over the small ledge she stood atop, “It’s not just for your sake.” 

  Quelana knows she could at least use the help to climb some of the higher ledges. Her physical prowess was never much to speak of.

  She takes Beatrice’s hand. It’s calloused, rough on palm and fingertips from what she can only imagine is work or holding her sturdy branch. She passively imagines her at work with it, weaving old magic like she used to know rather than the simplistic soul arrows she saw now. It is a kind of comfort. Her skin is darker, too, against Quelana’s sickly paleness.

 Beatrice counts to three and pulls, helping her up to the next step with ease. At the end of one more winding corridor is the valley. Beatrice does not release her hand until they are far off the walkways, far longer than necessary.

\--

  The sun near blinded Quelana, and it shone hardly half as bright as it had when Anor Londo still reigned. She doesn’t know why she expected it to more like when she had last seen it, for even then the Gods were deserting their sacred land, replaced with wandering humans and those exiled for their curse. A great cavern stretches below her, and she swears that if she stares hard enough into the vast blackness she could see her swamp that lay beneath. There are no rustling rabbits in the grass, the calls of birds are scarce and mournful. 

  The air seemed so thin up here.

  “How does the sun suit you, Madame?” Beatrice jokes, bowing and extending an arm like a servant guiding her mistress into a room. 

  “Not well.” Quelana grumbles. 

  “How unfortunate. I do hope you will keep up!” 

  Beatrice bounds eastward, towards what seemed to be a rickety wooden bridge, a speck in the distance. 

  “Beatrice! You will waste your energy!” she cries out to no avail. So, Quelana lifts her ragged skirt as not to trip, and runs after her.

**Author's Note:**

> i kno she doesn't spawn at the archtree but i figure she doesnt spend all her time hanging out in ogretown near her corrupted sister's nest so like [shrug emoji]   
> this may never update again, only time, and my poor work ethic, will tell,


End file.
